Marriage Is a Private Affair (1944)

Copyright 22 July 1944 by Loew's Inc. A Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer picture. New York opening at the Capitol: 26 October 1944. U.S. release: October 1944. Australian release: 26 April 1945. 10,444 feet. 116 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Lana played Theo Scofield, a New York playgirl, who "spends her winters in Miami and her summers in Reno," the latter while waiting for the next divorce of her much-married mother who tells her daughter "the first marriage, at least, should be romantic." On this theory, Theo marries Tom West, a fighter pilot on furlough, who is later grounded to handle an important war job in a laboratory. After their baby is born, Theo devotes herself conscientiously to being a model wife and mother. She tries hard at first, but has little faith in her ability to make a good wife. She misses her carefree youth, her string of boyfriends, the glitter and glamour of being loved by a lot of men instead of just one. When she runs into Miles Lancing, an ex-beau, Theo is annoyed because he doesn't act as romantic as he once did. So she dons a sexy gown and heads for the Officers' Club to find him and recapture his attention. But when she returns home that night she finds Tom angry because this was the night they were to celebrate their baby's first birthday. More misunderstandings and reconciliations follow. COMMENT: For once you can get a fair idea of a film's quality from the Synopsis. Believe you me, this talking bore of a story isn't any more lively in the rendering than the reading. True, it's stylishly directed and has lush production values. Lana Turner looks most attractive in cinematographer Ray June's flattering close-ups. And she wears enough costumes, gowns and ensembles to make every female in the audience green with envy. When she starts perambulating through the sets that look as if furnished by Diamond Jim while she strums out an apparently endless series of bogus emotional problems, every feminine heart will flutter - and every male vocal chord will start screaming for the end title.Trimmed of half its running time this Marriage Affair is passably entertaining. I once saw an expertly cut 65-minute version on TV. But as for 117 minutes of Mrs Lana T., leave her to the girls.

First let me say that Lana Turner certainly looks beautiful in her role as a woman who has no idea what she wants. Well, she does like to be pursued. And occasionally she likes the idea of marriage.This film is listed under the comedy genre. The few forays into the realm of comedy do not make this a comedy any more than her hallucinatory scenes of past lovers makes this a science fiction film. Actually, the film cannot decide what it wants to be. The swing from lighthearted banter to life-altering urgency and back prevents the viewer from fully investing emotionally in the perils of Theo (Ms. Turner).The only thing to recommend this film are the beautiful people who populate it. And the photography and fashion that frame them. The script must have been worked and reworked a hundred times by numerous scribes. It is so disjointed that in the end it leaves you wondering what it was all about. Yes, there is the neat "there's no place like home"-type attempt to put a neat ribbon on it all, but it rings hollow. Just look at the pretty people and smile.

I liked it. I thought it portrayed the struggles which many of us have. Lana Turner's character is undecided in life about quite a few issues, particularly marriage, though she also seems to have certain ideal views of these subjects. The last half of the movie I thought had the plot thicken so that her ambivalence would indeed make her character get stretched to the testing point. Actually quite a few testing points occur: with longtime boyfriend, husband, girlfriend, etc. After seeing the wreckage in her life and those around her, she does reach some mature decisions.While we each may not have the same marriage commitment problem this movie showed, we can nonetheless use it as metaphor for our other personal struggles.

The makers of this film had a premise: a woman whose childhood makes her a rather flakey person, a bit unsure of herself, picks one of her many suitors just to see if she can. But from there, the movie forgets drama. Why should she come to embrace marriage? It's not the birth of her son. It's not any one thing that happens to her. There's no plot catalyst in this movie, no psychological edge. It's more like a soap opera, where the characters change for no particular reason.